Customer Reviews

Norton Personal Firewall 2003

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

I've been a loyal Nortons user for years and recently upgraded from Norton Antivirus 2002 and Personal Firewall 2002 to the 2003 versions. The new Norton Antivirus works like a charm. The Personal Firewall 2003 (also a component of Internet Security) has a bug in it that prevents group emails (roughly 6-10 or more email addresses) from being delivered and forces a reboot of the computer to be able to send/receive mail again. Many dozen Personal Firewall 2003 users have duplicated the exact problem and reported it on Symantec's support site. Symantec agrees that many users report this problem but their support staff haven't found a fix yet.

My suggestion is to wait until the problem is fixed before buying a product which limits the usefulness of email.

Basically, if you have a connection to the Internet that is constantly open, you should get some kind of Firewall AND AnitVirus. I decided to buy Norton Personal Firewall 2003 because I have had Norton AntiVirus 2002 and it worked extremely well. Once I got the Firewall, I installed it easily and in about 5 minutes had both the Norton Firewall and the Norton AntiVirus integrated into ONE security box. The pop-up blocker also WORKS GREAT! Not one pop-up since. I recommend both Norton Personal Firewall 2003 and Norton AntiVirus 2003 because nobody knows when someone will either send you a virus or scan your computer looking to hack in. Yet with these two products you can rest assured that when something goes wrong in the security department, you will be well equipped to deal with it.

Symantec seems to have ironed out the kinks in the Internet Security software running under Windows XP. The software installed and updated itself and immediately began protecting the system which uses a cable modem with a router. The AD blocking is working well. I plan to buy another copy to run on another computer that is on the same cable modem. The firewall rules were automatically adapted to my usage - where as the last version could never seem to remember the rules and kept asking about internet access - so much so - that it was uninstalled. The trace feature is kind of nice, I received a TCP illegal flags attack and it tracked it down to Minneapolis and one from Bejing China.

This is an excellent product--anyone considering it ought to
also consider Norton Internet Security 2003. Both of these
software packages contain an OUTSTANDING ad blocking feature.
After installation, I visited numerous sites which had
previously dumped loads of pop-up and pop-under ad windows and
flash-based ads on my screen, but now -- POOF -- no more trash,
with no discernable negative effects on web page loading. Plus
ad banners are effectively eliminated--so all you get is the web
page you want. After a week of intensive use, I have yet to find
a problem with this software. I find it difficult to praise
this product enough--it delivers every feature smoothly and
efficiently, as advertised. I have it installed on my computer
along with Norton Cleansweep--no conflicts or flaws noted.

I have been running Norton Personal Firewall 2003 for several months now and I have been happy with it. However, Norton has a Live Update feature which updates your software when new versions are available. Of course, you would think this process would be reliable but they recently installed a patch that has caused a lot of problems for a lot of users. When the firewall works it works well. When something is wrong it can affect a lot of your software. After making the last update my whole Windows startup is screwed up and many of the serices don't start. Don't expect any support either. If you can't find it in their Knowledge Base, it costs $$$ just to contact a Support Person.

The product does what it claims,I had no problems installing and confiquring, the ad blocker works like a charm. I have had time to evaluate this firewall since I purchased it in October 2003, and it caused a shutdown issue that forced me to uninstall it. Everything worked great for the first few weeks, the live updates worked perfect, and I thought I had a winner here, but then problems. I mailed Symantec and they explained that my shutdown issue was not known to them, and directed me to downloads.microsoft.com to look for a download to resolve my computer hanging up at the shutdown command. Finally I just uninstalled the firewall, and reinstalled, then everything was fine for several weeks, and then back to problems. I'm running Windows 98SE, and this software won't work on my machine.

I bought the Firewall 2003 with the Norton Anti virus professional Edition 2003 and they both work so well together! I can use my Firewall to operate my Antivirus and everything. I had no problems installing this Firewall and it runs smoothly like a charm. If you're having problems with Installation just disable Windows XP firewall, but I don't know, I have Zone Alarm (basic) installed in my computer and even they work pretty good together with no problems with the installments. I just installed it, downloaded my Live updates, and everything was fine! I have heard some people say they have had a hard time getting on the internet after installation here's a hint: When the firewall ask you if you want your internet provider to access click "permit". It's seems so silly that anyone would have a problem with it. It even had a pop up ad blocker that block those annoying ads! I don't know about anyone else but I feel safe knowing I have this Firewall, I now know every single thing going on with my computer including easy access to web logs and past visited sites. While all my personal info stays with me alone!

Please check your system requirements before buying. I don't know just trying to figure out how anyone could have a single problem with this product.

I was a former user of McAfee Firewall, but it never worked for me unless I told it to block all traffic. Norton Firewall was easy to set up and its already blocked two trojan horse attacks on my computer.

In my opinion, if you use a cable or DSL modem you can't go wrong with Norton Personal Firewall to protect your computer.

If you are on broadband, you really should have a firewall for your protection and nothing I've seen or used works as well as Norton's Personal Firewall. Absolutely no problems with installation and very user-friendly. I highly recommend this product and Norton Anti-Virus - they work wonderfully together, they are easy to install and offer a superior internet protection to comparable products. This product works very well with Windows XP.

I've been using Norton products for long time (over 15 years), here's some comments to share:
1. If you have DSL/Cable (for $30 per month it's worth to think about it) , you need both software (Personal Firewall) and hardware (router) to protect your system. It's not a 100% safe, of course. No router? Then get one (as low as 20 bucks)even you have only one computer.
2. Setup is easy, most functions are self-explained. I never needed to read the manual (it's good thing, right?).
3. I'm using HP 2.4GHz / WinXP (desktop, others laptops using Win2K), everything (until now) is ok. I installed McAfee firewall (come w/ VirusScan 7.0) before but it's changed my DHCP setting (assigned different IP instead of my original one) and screw up my home network, lots of hazard and lost time... so I stay with Norton.
4. New software usually don't run well with old software (like Win98) w/ little memory even they claim their products are fully compatiable. If you're using Windows, no reason not to upgrade to at least 2000 version...to save you countless hours for system maintenance.
5. Some (Many?) people said Norton products slow the system performance. I don't feel this way, for me it's acceptable. Many magazines have performance reports available, so check by yourself to decide which is best for you. RAM is so cheap today (I added one DDR PC2100 256Mb to my system less than $16, work perfect...& I found this price is still too high...), what do you want me to say?
6. Take care the Rebates for Norton by yourself, make copies to keep record. They're slow and don't inform you the progress -- bad service. Email them to ask if the money don't come within the reasonable time.